Year: 2021
Type: article
Abstract: The present study is a retrospective analysis to determine whether sex differences in cognition exist in children and young adults (i.e., those between 4 and 18 years of age) and to further identify when these differences emerge across cognitive development. A cross-sectional research design was used to analyze data previously collected by a third-party collaborator. Data (N = 8,184) was collected using the Cambridge Brain Science cognitive test battery, followed by a demographic questionnaire completed by participants’ parents or guardians. Data were analyzed using factorial analysis of variance with age and gender as fixed factors. The results demonstrate that females score higher in verbal and reasoning domains as well as in tasks measuring deductive reasoning and attention. Males score higher in the short-term memory domain and in tasks measuring their spatial short-term memory. The emergence of sex differences in cognition varied across tasks, either appearing at the elementary (4 to 9 years), middle (10 to 13 years), or high school (14 to 18 years) levels. The effect of sex was absent when controlling for cofounding variables. The findings demonstrate that females and males are more similar than different from a cognitive perspective.
Authors: Tamar Gelb, Connor Wild, Adrian M. Owen
Language: English
Subfield: Experimental and Cognitive Psychology
Field: Psychology
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Gender equality
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W3215509886